Modena, the reasons for the meetings that will animate the Festivalori, the mayor: “Understanding Finance is a way to interpret everyday life in a different way”

MODENA – “A great lesson in civic education” and a project that the Municipality of Modena “wants to support”. It is with these words that the mayor Massimo Mezzetti speaks of <a href="https://www.world-today-news.com/solidarity-economy-festivalori-returns-to-modena-meetings-and-insights-dedicated-to-ethical-finance/" title="Solidarity economy, “FestiValori” returns to Modena: meetings and insights dedicated to ethical finance“>FestiValorithe first ethical finance festival, scheduled from 17 to 20 October, with a vast and heterogeneous series of events, shows, workshops, here the complete program of 4 days. Objective: to make the general public aware of a world too often considered distant from us, that of finance, but on which numerous aspects of our lives depend, without us even realizing it. A way to learn to read everyday life in a different way, also trying to imagine a new development model, more respectful of the environment, territories, communities and rights.

The reasons for this meeting. “It is a necessary and appropriate festival – said the mayor of Modena – I consider these events to be great civic education lessons that allow us to move better in the complexity of the present”. Finance concerns and involves everyone, but it is not explained. Illiteracy on crucial issues such as these also has a social cost. there are many, too many, careless investments that have produced small, large earthquakes in savers who have trusted without adequate preparation. “All of this – added Massimo Mezzetti – must be taken into account when we continue not to update our school programs to the challenges of the contemporary world. And a local authority can do a lot with respect to all this, such as supporting activities such as Festivalorifor example. It can intervene on contracts, avoiding the use of maximum discounts, and implement urban planning by making the true public interest prevail. In short, choices that take into account an overall vision of the city.”

The impact with the climate and disasters in Emilia and Romagna. A FestiValori this year we will talk about agriculture and climate, topics that affect Emilia-Romagna more than directly. Here, the mayor of the host city could only refer to the environmental disasters that have hit the Region. “The public authorities are aware of the need to act on climate warming. Let’s say that if they weren’t, and I’m obviously thinking of the floods of 2023 and 2024, it would be dramatic. I believe that in recent years awareness has increased on the part of political decision makers, certainly more slowly than the account that was dramatically presented with the events I have just mentioned and they find climate change one of the triggering factors. If episodes considered to have much longer return times arrive every year, I think the role played by climate change is evident. We are too slow to react.”

The theme of weapons. In the four days of the festival there will also be space for another major theme: the spread of weapons. For those who do ethical finance, the arms race does not lead to peace. “We live in a complex world – added Mayor Mezzetti – where war is the protagonist in the inability of actors like Europe to play even a minimal role. I’m not talking about the United Nations, unfortunately increasingly discredited and considered irrelevant. I’m talking about the European Union, the political construction born from the tragedy of the Second World War and which guaranteed decades of peace to this continent today appears aphasic. This inability to have an impact, I don’t want to think it’s an unwillingness, pains us.”

Profits and natural resources. Another theme at the center of the festival will be the maximization of profits at all costs, which leads to an unsustainable use of natural resources, circumvention of respect for rights, and the exploitation of tax havens. A field on which companies will be summoned for a discussion that promises to be very interesting. “The most astute companies – concluded Mezzetti – are already making fair and sustainable choices. If you look in the long term and not just at maximizing immediate profits, you understand that it is the only possible path and, I speak as mayor, a municipality like that of Modena is ready to stand alongside these companies”.